The Affective and Psychomotor Domains
The Affective and Psychomotor Domains
Affective domain
- Stresses values, feelings, and attitudes.
- Five levels: receiving, responding, valuing, organizing, being characterized by a value.
Psychomotor domain
- Stresses muscular and motor skills needing neuro-muscular coordination.
- Six levels: reflex movements, fundamental movements, perceptual abilities, physical abilities, skilled movements, non-discursive communication.
Using the framework
- Every lesson should have objectives in each of the three domains and at different levels.
The cognitive domain handles the mind, but learning is more than thinking. Two further domains complete the picture: the affective, which deals with the heart, and the psychomotor, which deals with the body. A curriculum that uses only the cognitive domain leaves both of these untaught on purpose.
The affective domain
The affective domain stresses values, feelings, and attitudes. Its relevant behaviours range from simply paying attention all the way to acting consistently on a personal value. It rises through five levels:
- Receiving: paying attention to something.
- Responding: reacting to it, taking part.
- Valuing: attaching worth to it.
- Organizing: fitting the value into a system of values.
- Being characterized by a value: acting consistently from that value, so it defines the person.
The progression runs from a passing notice to a settled character trait. An objective about developing tolerance, for instance, aims much higher up this ladder than one about merely listening politely.
Values, feelings, and attitudes, rising through five levels
Receiving, responding, valuing, organizing, and being characterized by a value. The progression runs from merely paying attention to acting consistently from a value that defines the person.
The psychomotor domain
The psychomotor domain stresses muscular or motor skills, the kind that require neuro-muscular coordination. It is the domain of doing with the body, and it rises through six levels:
- Reflex movements: involuntary responses.
- Fundamental movements: basic actions like walking and grasping.
- Perceptual abilities: coordinating senses with movement.
- Physical abilities: strength, endurance, and flexibility.
- Skilled movements: learned, complex actions.
- Non-discursive communication: expressive movement, such as gesture or posture.
| Domain | What it covers | Top level |
|---|---|---|
| Cognitive | Intellectual skills | Evaluation |
| Affective | Values and attitudes | Being characterized by a value |
| Psychomotor | Motor skills | Non-discursive communication |
Muscular and motor skills needing neuro-muscular coordination
Its six levels run from reflex movements and fundamental movements through perceptual and physical abilities to skilled movements and non-discursive (expressive) communication.
Using all three domains
The domains and their levels are not just a filing system. They provide a framework for examining and assessing instructional objectives: a developer can lay objectives against the domains and levels to see what a curriculum reaches and what it misses.
The practical suggestion that follows is ambitious: every lesson should have objectives in each of the three domains and at different levels within each domain. A lesson built this way teaches the mind, the attitudes, and the skills together, and stretches learners across the range of each domain rather than parking them at the bottom. Few lessons hit all of this perfectly, but holding it as the aim keeps a curriculum from shrinking into pure cognitive recall.
Aim for objectives in all three domains, and at different levels, in every lesson
The domains and levels let a developer assess what a curriculum reaches and misses. Reaching all three, across their levels, teaches mind, attitudes, and skills together rather than mere recall.
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